


everything you say (is a sweet revelation)

by smithens



Series: hey, i just met you (and this is crazy) [2]
Category: Downton Abbey
Genre: Developing Relationship, Dialogue Heavy, Extended Scene, Falling In Love, Flirting, Fluff, Gay Pragmatic Idealism, Getting to Know Each Other, Late Night Conversations, M/M, Male Homosexuality, Mutual Pining, Unresolved Romantic Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-20
Updated: 2019-12-20
Packaged: 2021-02-26 23:27:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,945
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21877342
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smithens/pseuds/smithens
Summary: The conversation in the stableyard doesn't end with aeroplanes.
Relationships: Thomas Barrow/Richard Ellis
Series: hey, i just met you (and this is crazy) [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1557004
Comments: 33
Kudos: 135





	everything you say (is a sweet revelation)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [likehandlingroses](https://archiveofourown.org/users/likehandlingroses/gifts).



> this fic is for likehandlingroses, because we apparently share a brain! :-3 
> 
> this fic refers to the [downton abbey thomas & richard deleted scene (thomasbarrowlesbian on tumblr)](https://thomasbarrowlesbian.tumblr.com/post/189624447246/) because i am now just considering it canon. 
> 
> title once again from [carly rae jepsen's i really like you](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=77PzXCKDyVQ).
> 
> this fic was meant to be 5k words. whoops.

And only two months ago Lindbherg made it across the Atlantic on his own.

Thomas might not (probably won't) make it to 1977, is the thing. 1967, maybe, if he takes good care of himself, but seeing as he didn't bother with that so much for the first nearly-forty years of his life… 

Well, it would be nice if anything were to happen in his favour — in _their_ favour — before then. Still, he'll take the small victories, at this point. They're so far and few between that sometimes he has to force himself to see every little good thing as monumental just to keep moving forward, because he's not quite reached the point yet where he's got a sense of the big picture. Baxter says he will, eventually, but she doesn't _know,_ does she, she can't, and despite… finding out about Ellis, although who knows where this is going, it's like every time he has something to reach for it crumbles in his hands by the time he actually gets to it.

And sometimes he doesn't have to reach, and things find him, but they slip through his fingers anyway.

Or smash through his fingers, in the case of tonight.

Still: small victories.

He did hold a man in his arms, dance with someone he actually wanted to dance with, do something he'd always dreamed of and seen as foolish and silly (bloody hell does he need to think before he opens his mouth) and done it out in the open in a way he'd never even imagined could be possible, and all anyone around had to say about it was _keep at it, you'll pick it up soon_ and _it was about time, Webster_ and _good to see someone new about_ and _don't they make a lovely couple_ , all with smiles and wolf-whistles _,_ none of which are the sort of thing he expects to hear ever again in his life. And, naturally, neither the cops nor the sergeant nor the warden shared those sentiments —

_Small victories._

Thomas takes a deep breath. 

Ellis seems to notice, and he also seems to be on the verge of speaking again, but it takes a moment.

Then:

"The children upstairs — do you ever spend time with them?"

That is… not what he'd expected he might say next.

"Er, I do, yeah."

"Yeah?"

"We get on all right."

"Do you?"

"Like to think so," Thomas says, slow. He's not sure where this is going. "I've known them all since they were born."

"That makes you a constant, then, doesn't it?"

Does it?

"I do live in their house," he quips.

"You _run_ their house."

It's not mock-serious, either.

"Have to say, I'm jealous. No little ones running around Buckingham Palace — not that I'd have a chance to know them if there were, mind." 

"Plenty of chances for everything, at Downton Abbey."

"Taken a few, myself," Ellis says, smiling at him like he was before they drove out of York, and if that weren't enough to send him reeling, he takes off his hat as they approach the back porch, too.

Thomas represses the very sudden and very strong urge to reach out and run his fingers through his hair, which is only _slightly_ less immaculate than it was earlier in the day.

The same could not be said for him, he's sure.

He takes off his own hat and tries to catch his breath so that he can _say something,_ because he's done a terrible job thus far of not letting his emotions show all over his face, and if he's talking he at least has a reason to be looking at Ellis the way he surely is.

"Best parts of my day are when they're around, to be honest," he manages, very nonchalant, which takes enormous effort, seeing as they really are just close enough that he needn't even reach very far to —

 _God,_ he's pathetic, isn't he.

" — but, er, don't really have a clue how that happened."

"Well, they see you more than their own parents, don't they?" 

"I suppose."

He'd meant more along the lines of, _I didn't care at all for children until I was thirty and missing someone I had no business missing more than I could bear._

But it's been seven years, and now he loves them, those of the house and others alike.

Probably just part of his personality now.

"How it goes with their class, isn't it," Ellis says after a moment, a touch resentful, a twitch in the corner of his mouth that Thomas finds himself wanting to kiss away. "Their Lords and Ladyships wouldn't know what to do with a child if it were around longer than an hour."

He is saved by the reality that even if Ellis wanted to be kissed, which is… possible? 

… that even if he did, this would be a very odd part of the conversation in which to do it.

"Don't know if I would, myself," Thomas tells him. 

He does see the children for significantly more than an hour each day, when everything's added up, but not all at once. It's enough, really, but maybe only because it has to be.

It's not as though he'll ever get any more than what he's got now.

"Oh, I'm sure you'd manage, Mr Barrow."

His grin is so affecting that Thomas forgets he's meant to be letting them back into the house — Ellis has been nothing but smiles since he arrived, where Thomas is concerned, and it's struck him several times in the last hour that even now that he's got a friend and allies and something resembling respect from everyone downstairs, or at least he thinks he does, he's been smiled at more times in the last few days than in the last few months.

 _Real_ smiles, genuine happy-to-be-in-your-company ones that are meant to be more than just politeness to the man who pays you.

Unless he counts what he's had this week as just a single very long one, which he could, because the first time Thomas had seen any other expression on the man's face (other than _I am a servant and thus an unremarkable piece of furniture_ ) was when he walked out of the police station an hour ago.

…whether that says more about his staff or Mr Ellis, he has no idea.

Probably the latter — all he's ever known is what everyone else in his life gives him, and that's not much, necessarily, so it's his behaviour that's extraordinary, not theirs.

Ellis happens to be an extraordinary person.

So extraordinary Thomas still hasn't unlocked the bloody door yet because he's been staring at his mouth again, so he fumbles to find the key in his pocket and then just holds it.

He doesn't want this to be over just yet.

"It's late," says Ellis.

It certainly is.

"Wonder if they pulled it off," he adds, and it takes Thomas longer than it should for him remember what _it_ is.

"Guess we'll find out," he replies, still very much sounding like an adult man who has not been eyeing another one up, although who knows how long he'll keep his composure this time, "we have to be quiet either way, though."

Ellis puts his finger to his lips.

— two seconds, if that. Thomas swallows, lips parted, staring, remembering.

Not breaking any goddamn records as far as the length of time he isn't making a fool of himself is concerned.

 _I am dreaming,_ he thinks, heat rising in his cheeks, _I am going to wake up and it will be July 21st and I will be getting ready for a day of watching Carson get forced out of a job he was brought in especially for, and I am going to enjoy it but not nearly as much as I am enjoying this and enjoyed that but then maybe that's a small price to pay for not getting tossed into a police wagon —_

"Shall we go inside?"

He is not dreaming.

"Yeah, er, just a second," and he manages to get the key into the lock on the first try, thank fucking God, so he turns it and opens the door, cringing when the hinges creak.

The passage is dark and deserted, luckily.

Neither of them do more than take off their gloves and overcoats before they're just standing there, staring at each other.

Ellis says, "it's all they've ever known."

Not quite comprehending, Thomas blinks at him.

Ellis smiles, small and genuine and honest, less teasing. Not that he minds when it _is_ teasing — except that he does, because in the back of his mind he knows that's all this is, that he's being taken to like one might take to a helpless stray, or, if he's being optimistic, which he's beginning to find is surprisingly easy to do in this man's company, like… 

Well, maybe like he wants to be friends.

Then, why would a man touch another man's lips if all he wanted was to be bloody _friends_.

Ellis tilts his head to one side, expectant, and Thomas says, "sorry?"

"That man can fly."

"Oh."

So he was making a point.

"If he's at all like my nephew," Ellis continues, "to Master George Crawley, it's a regular thing, isn't it, aeroplanes and the like."

A regular thing.

"The boy's never known anything else; it's just the way the world is, for him."

Just the way the world is.

"We've got electricity and aeroplanes and telephones and radio broadcasting — children these days will never understand what life was like without those things, for how commonplace they've become." 

_Commonplace._

And in the darkness Ellis manages somehow to find his hand and clasp it, squeeze his fingers, and all of a sudden Thomas has to press his eyes shut and breathe slow and steady to keep from crying, because God, he's tired, and he just might know where this is going, what the point _is,_ what it always was, and for some reason it frightens him to think on it, to think hard about what he's really saying and what he _isn't_ saying and let himself get anywhere near believing it —

"Little girls are growing up knowing they'll get to vote someday, and young lads of working parents'll have school 'til they're sixteen; and they'll take those things for granted, won't they? Try as their grandparents might, they'll never understand it, they'll think they've always had those privileges — won't even see it as a privilege, choosing members of parliament and studying trigonometry.

"And I like to think maybe we'll be seen as that someday, too, Mr Barrow, so ordinary and quotidian you couldn't possibly explain to a child that it hasn't always… been the way. For folks like us to live freely."

Imagine that.

Thomas cannot, he realises, not after what he's just been through, and he says so, voice wavering.

"Nor can I. But I can hope."

"I don't even know what to hope _for._ "

Even to his own ears, he sounds despondent.

"Something better," Ellis offers, and he gives his hand one last squeeze before letting go. His voice is so gentle that Thomas feels like he can look at him again without bursting into tears, maybe even that if he did start crying he wouldn't mind it, so he opens his eyes and blinks a few times.

"Yeah."

And then he looks away because in fact he is _not_ prepared to cry in front of him, by all rights they're still bloody strangers, even if Ellis just stuck his neck out for him in a manner that he'll never be able to thank him properly for, not in a way that matters, even if they've spent the last hour baring their souls to one another.

Thomas swallows back the feeling, musters up all of his courage, and asks, "d'you want tea or anything?"

It's got to be nearing two in the morning, but he can't bring himself to care, unless Ellis cares, and he probably does, seeing as he's so put together and efficient and everything and he's going back to London tomorrow and has plenty to do besides, and Thomas is very close to spluttering _sorry stupid idea let's go up_ when Ellis breaks out into a wide and very handsome smile.

"Tea'd be excellent."

Weight off his shoulders, that.

(Every time he smiles Thomas forgets that he should really know better than to think anything is actually going to come from this.)

Seeing as there's a hall boy and a Royal chambermaid about, the servants' hall isn't exactly private, and if they're going to talk about anything of substance (if he's going to have a close one with crying again) privacy's a necessity, so Thomas unlocks the door to the pantry, too, tells Ellis to go ahead and get settled.

He doesn't, though, only puts his things down, and when Thomas says, "I'll put the kettle on," he replies, "I'll come with you."

While Thomas is not about to complain about a man wanting to follow him around, especially if it's this man in particular, this does mean he can't use the next few minutes to put himself back together.

To the kitchen they go, and neither of them speak as Thomas gets the range in order — Ellis is leaning his elbows on the island, just watching.

Thomas can feel him doing it, somehow, and it makes him uncomfortable but not in a bad way, which puts him on edge regardless, because what the hell is he even _feeling_.

He takes the kettle to the sink, turns the tap, and says, "so you have a nephew," because that's evidently a safe topic and something he's likely to enjoy hearing about. Part of his personality now and all that, doing all right with the little ones.

"I've got five."

Wow.

"Nieces?"

"Six."

That is… a lot of children, nowadays, but reasonable, especially if he's from a Victorian family.

"Siblings?"

"Two."

Thomas sets the water to boil, turns around raises his eyebrows.

"Old-fashioned, are they?"

"They made up for me," he returns, a twinkle in his eye. 

_Bloody hell._

Lucky they don't have tea yet, or he'd have just spit his out. 

"What, on purpose?"

Ellis props himself up to his hands, presses his lips together like he's trying not to laugh — it's a very charming look on him — and then… 

"No," laughing as the word leaves his mouth and then shutting up immediately with a glance over his shoulder to the passageway, and all Thomas can do is his damndest not to swoon. Not really because of the conversation at hand, they could be speaking of just about anything and he's sure he'd be falling over all the same, just because Ellis is really incredible and keeps getting _better._

Being incapable of speech does at least mean he can't say anything daft, so that's covered, and as for _doing_ something daft, they are going to need a tea cosy soon enough, so he makes to grab one.

Behind him, Ellis says, more seriously but still lighthearted, "maybe after a point."

Huh.

Other reasons for that, though, really. He has an excellent excuse not to do what regular folks would expect from him.

"Well, you do work in service," Thomas replies, "not exactly the best choice of industry if you wanted to start a family," matter-of-fact and mostly to himself, because in every other big house in England and small ones, too, being a husband, father, and valet all at the same time is impossible. Given how big the big house is where Ellis is concerned, he doubts anyone is demanding grandchildren of him.

The words are met with silence; when he looks back, Ellis has his eyebrows raised and lips quirked.

"Oh."

Not merely an excuse, by that look.

"My parents knew before I did," Ellis says, airy.

And he still goes to see them on his nights off. 

_Teaspoons,_ he tells himself, _mugs,_ here is something else to keep his hands and eyes busy, but the bitter slips from his tongue before he can stop it: "so did mine." 

But he knows he can't blame him for it, no one chooses their family, and it's no use being resentful. He doesn't want to resent Ellis for anything — even if he did, he doesn't have the right. Really, this is yet one more thing that makes him perfect, another reason he's too good for him. 

Not that he's for him at all.

" – er, tell me more about your family?"

"I'm the youngest of three," Ellis says, without skipping a beat. He does have a way with that, of smoothing things over before the edges even start to curl up. It's not a skill Thomas possesses, he tends to make things worse, but at least this time he stops himself from saying _so am I_. "Got a sister and a brother."

"With eleven children between them," Thomas prompts.

"Ida's got three boys and two girls; Leonard has the rest."

Leonard Ellis, Ida Used-to-be-Ellis, and… 

Richard Ellis, it had said on his card. The three of them could be characters out of some moral family novel, names like that.

Thomas isn't sure they've been properly introduced, now that he thinks of it. He would have remembered his Christian name if he'd known it before this evening, because he's remembered just about everything, thus far. That tends to be what happens when handsome men he doesn't know well are around, even when, as had been the case here, he thinks nothing could possibly come of it.

It's not often he's so happy to be wrong.

Not ever, in fact.

After all, this is the stark opposite of all the ways he's been wrong in the past, even if he has to keep reminding himself that just because Ellis _is_ like him doesn't mean he _likes_ him.

He's reminding himself so often he's starting to think that maybe he's wrong about that, too.

The water is beginning to boil; he starts setting up a tray.

"Sounds like a handful."

"Children are a poor man's riches, Mr Barrow."

 _How are you so charming,_ Thomas thinks, but when he turns around, Ellis isn't quite smiling anymore.

…with good reason, given. 

"How often do you…"

"Once or twice a year."

This is the closest he's come to looking unhappy over the last few days, poor bloke.

"Used to be more a few years back, before I had this position, but His Majesty's not much of a family man, is he?"

His tone is like it was when he'd said _have to be more circumspect;_ when he'd said, in the car, after they were out of the city centre and Thomas had gotten his conversational sea legs back again, _the law's the law, Mr Barrow, so much as I'd do anything to change it._

 _Just the way the world is_ doesn't only account for pleasant things.

"Didn't get that impression, no," says Thomas slowly.

"Plenty of work to do, besides. That's the way of service."

"Yeah."

Ellis suddenly straightens. "I ought to be helping you."

As if on cue, the kettle starts whistling, and Thomas grabs it before it can wake anyone up.

"You've helped me already," he replies, trying to be casual about it.

"Really, it's the least I can – "

Oh, _please._

"Far beyond that, aren't we?"

"Idle hands," Ellis says slyly, and Thomas can't deny that face anything, so he tells him where the milk and sugar is and lets him have at it while he fixes the teapot.

"Which one is sugar?"

Huh.

"Third from the left, I think, beside the flour? Most of the canisters have – "

"You'll have to show me, wouldn't want to take the alum by mistake."

Refreshing to have someone so cautious around, in a way, but this is why he hadn't asked for help. Easier to do things himself where the house is concerned. He grabs the sugar bowl and goes to the cupboards, tries not to go mad when Ellis steps toward him as he approaches and their shoulders brush together and he doesn't move away when it happens, doesn't say _excuse me_ or act like he's been burned for touching him.

"Hopeless with this sort of thing," Ellis says lightly.

The sugar is in the third jar from the left, beside the flour. It's turned to the side; the label is only half visible.

But half visible is still visible.

Thomas raises his eyebrows. "Reading, you mean?"

He feels him shrug against his arm.

"Following instructions, Mr Barrow."

This has to be flirting; it _has_ to be, why else would he have done it if he wasn't interested, and he really should make his own thoughts clear, get the ball back into his court, but his mouth has gone dry and he doesn't think he can speak without his voice cracking like he's a fourteen year old boy and he can't look at him because he knows he's smiling and that's going to make his heart flip over — what is it about him that makes Thomas _fumble_ like this? 

Ellis takes the bowl from his hands, and though their shoulders part, he makes no effort to avoid contact with the tips of Thomas's fingers.

He can't _stand_ this, and he pulls his hands away and clasps them in front of him, says, "better be careful about the noise."

And so they say nothing until they're in the pantry with everything in order, seated by the fireplace.

"Whole family was there tonight," Ellis says. "Children and everything."

He takes his tea with milk, poured in at the end, not before, and no sugar.

Thomas doesn't take sugar, himself.

The irony of it all is too much, but it's encouraging that he made such an affair over it, gives him some confidence. Him pulling a stunt like that makes his intentions clear.

Except for how it doesn't. He's not certain what business he has being interested in him, what with everything — he lives in London, for fuck's sake, he could have anyone he wanted. Add to that the fact that he's only here for one more night and they're not exactly in let's-take-this-to-the-bedroom territory…

It's not going to go anywhere. Nothing ever does.

But it's nice to pretend — and with someone worth pretending with, for that matter. 

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. I had no idea they'd be about — Mum didn't even know for certain I'd be by until a few days ago, don't know how they managed." He laughs. "Then, she's been begging I come down since the tour was announced… reckon it was her plan all along, to make a big reunion out of it. Mothers are like that, I suppose."

Thomas wouldn't know anymore.

"You really do get on, then? With your parents and the rest of them?" he asks, just before he burns his tongue on the first sip — at which he says "augh," and scrunches up his face over it; Ellis looks at him with an amused expression.

Like he finds him endearing.

(He really needs to do something attractive eventually.)

"To a point," Ellis says eventually, but he's beaming now. "Was right delighted to see everyone, but even folks you love can get to be too much."

Probably why he was so late. 

Thomas nods, stares at his tea, tries not to sound too incredulous when he says, "I meant about – "

"Oh."

"Yeah."

The answer is obvious, but he wants to hear it out loud — if he's only thinking of it, just guessing, it isn't real, and for some reason he really wants to know that it is, that not every family is like his own and that Ellis had a good upbringing, that he's got people in his corner.

"We do," he replies, all soft. He taps his foot on the floor; Thomas moves his gaze to his shoe. "I'm sure that sounds very unusual – "

"Sounds bloody incredible."

And then silence.

Thomas looks up to find him frowning. 

"You mustn't think my parents are perfect."

"Seem perfect to me," Thomas mutters. It just slips out.

"They aren't," says Ellis softly.

"Mine don't let me in the house," he counters, far more sharply than's warranted — at all, but especially given that Ellis knows his family and Thomas doesn't, and if he says they're not perfect he probably has a good reason.

Doesn't stop him from being jealous, though, even if he doesn't want to be; five seconds ago he was happy at the mere idea of him being happy himself, and now…

"I wish that weren't so."

…and he doesn't even say it like he pities him; the words are earnest and careful, like he would change it if he could, and he can't be bitter, not in the face of someone who seems already to know him inside and out and doesn't even mind what's _there._

Thomas presses the heel of his hand to his eye and huffs, "don't _you_ have a way of making everything all right," finds himself for the hundredth time in the damn evening willing himself not to cry, because apparently he's incapable of staying in the same mood for more than five seconds.

Understandably, Ellis doesn't seem to know what to say to that: he looks slightly taken aback, then he settles and just seems pensive. He does nod, though.

"Thank you," Thomas says, when he's still silent a few moments later. "Don't think I can say it enough."

And then he takes his mug again and starts sipping in earnest. 

"You have."

"I haven't," he counters, trying to sound blithe — which is difficult, seeing as he's once again thinking of where he'd be right now if the man sitting in front of him was all what he'd seemed.

Same place he was a few hours ago.

Not an especially pleasant one.

Ellis hums, takes a drink of his tea, gives him a close-mouthed smile before saying, "I've spent the last several days thinking to myself that you were too cautious."

Now _that's_ interesting.

"Sorry to disappoint," Thomas quips.

Ellis raises his eyebrows.

"Haven't yet made up my mind."

Maybe this _is_ going to last.

If he were half as reckless as one might think he'd be, as Ellis thought he was, given all he got up to tonight, Thomas would take this as an opportunity to say _oh, you haven't, have you?_ and hop in his lap or something, but he isn't. He hasn't been for years; the thought of making the first move _(would it be the first move?)_ now has him deeply uncomfortable.

If they'd met back when he was… 

He'd have ruined it somehow.

"I did tell you I didn't know what I was getting into," he says, in an approximation of an I-told-you-so tone.

Ellis laughs, gives him a look that makes him feel flushed in the face.

"Tell me, Mr Barrow — is it more rash to go with a stranger to a place you do know about or to one you don't?"

But he's smiling.

"Touché," Thomas replies. He tries his tea again and doesn't burn himself this time; Ellis, he notices, is watching him, as he does. When he sets the mug down, he clasps his hands in his lap between his knees so as not to fidget. Ellis sits with his legs crossed, calm and composed.

Thomas wonders if he ever smokes.

"Been wondering for the last hour if I'd have found out, had none of that happened."

"Found what out?"

This makes Ellis raise his eyebrows, and Thomas understands in an instant why that was a stupid question. He turns from him, licks at his lips and stares at his knees, bashful — he's never done this before, never actually sat down with another man and done the whole flirting and tell-me-about-yourself and cap setting thing. Never _just talked._ He's not been _completely_ isolated his whole life, there have been London seasons and visiting parties and the war, always the war, but in all of those cases they'd… skipped talking, to say the least. And if they did talk, it wasn't about themselves. 

Thankfully, Ellis doesn't tease this time; doesn't say _ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer_ using some eloquent turn of phrase that would make him blush more than a cut and dry rebuff would.

"You."

"Yeah."

"What do you think?"

Thomas shrugs.

"Haven't thought about it."

"Think about it now, then."

He makes everything seem like it ought to be easy and smooth sailing, but it isn't. It's a tough question to answer. Thomas is fairly certain he wouldn't have said anything, himself — he never makes the first move, ever. Not for a long time. But he might have given it away by accident, despite his best efforts. After all, Thomas has spent the past several days doing his best to keep his distance, lest anyone of his lot get the wrong impression. He's gone out of his way not to sit beside him or stand too close, not to smile too wide or laugh too loud, been careful not to catch Ellis when he's alone… and not to look too excited when Ellis has caught him.

Funny that that's how this started, was Ellis catching him alone. 

_"Run into trouble?"_

_Thomas looked up at him and blinked._

_Had he been watching him?_

_"Sixteen down."_

_"Try me."_

_"Did I ask for your help?"_

_Far more blunt than he'd meant for it to be, but could you really blame him? — still, Ellis only smiled, which was something he wouldn't have expected and didn't mind at all now that it had happened._

_"No," he said smoothly. He didn't go on._

_Unceremonious, Thomas passed over the paper; Ellis took it and laid it before him without closing his book._

_"Sixteen down," Thomas repeated._

_"Unbridled?"_

_"Doesn't fit. Eight letters."_

_"Ought've actually looked at the thing, I suppose."_

_And then he did, and Thomas watched, a familiar and unwelcome thrum building in his chest and forehead. The way Ellis ran his finger just above the surface of the paper enthralled him, as did the turn in his lip, the lift in his eyebrow, the way he said "huh," eyes passing back and forth along the rows of black and white boxes. A stupid, boyish part of him was giddy at the notion that the man in front of him was touching the same thing he'd touched._

_A stupid, boyish, bloody_ dangerous _part of him._

_It was absurd._

_Ellis stared at the puzzle in front of him for what seemed like ages, then shrugged and slid it back over. "Haven't a clue."_

_"Might've made a mistake going across," mused Thomas, heart pounding. He folded the whole thing back up and then went back to his tea, because if he didn't keep his hands occupied somehow, he'd worry at his fingers — especially after what had just come over him. "What are you reading?"_

_"A novel," Ellis said._

_"Imagine that."_

_Ellis laid his finger on the page before him and closed the book with a smile — to himself, clearly, not to Thomas, but that wasn't going to stop him from getting bloody butterflies over it._

_If only he were like the rest of the Royal staff, pompous and unappealing… as opposed to what he's turned out to be, which beyond extraordinarily handsome is witty, and kind, and diplomatic, and fun, and above all, comfortable to be alone in the same room with him as they are now._

_Been a while since there had been a man downstairs who was that last thing, but then, Ellis didn't know why he shouldn't be, now, did he?_

_And he wouldn't, if Thomas had a say in it._

_"By Osbert Sitwell."_

_"Never heard of him."_

_"It's a debut. Came out about a year ago."_

_"You're very modern, Mr Ellis, aren't you?"_

_"In certain respects, yeah."_

_Thomas took a sip from his mug and found that it had gone cold._

_How long had they been just sitting here, silent in one another's company?_

_"Would think you're alone in that, working where you do."_

_"I am."_

_And then he grinned._

_Thomas looked away so as not to stare at his mouth._

_There was a poignant pause._

_"…right," said Ellis eventually. "Er, I'd better get back to work — you'll tell me when you've made up your mind?"_

_"About…?"_

_"Coming to York with me."_

_Well._

_When he put it like that…_

_"We'll see."_

_"I'll think of something for us to do," Ellis assured him, as he stood from his chair. "Wouldn't want to bore you. Not often men like us get time off, is it?"_

_They weren't nearly so alike as Ellis thought, but they did have that in common, and he'd take from him what he could get… and what he was taking was that Ellis saw them as cut of the same cloth, and that was going to be enough. More than enough. Especially seeing as he wouldn't be around long enough to learn otherwise._

_"Honest work, isn't it, service," Thomas said at last — it was meant to be dry, bitter, even, but he couldn't keep himself from smiling, couldn't leave the pleased lilt out of his voice. He'd have to tone it down, later, he wasn't about to walk around seeming too excited about going somewhere with another man, but…_

_"You can say that again — see you around, Mr Barrow."_

_"See you."_

_It was nice to feel normal for once._

Thomas decides on saying, "not unless you gave word first."

Ellis nods, considering this. "Sounds cautious to me."

"I didn't say I wasn't," Thomas counters.

"No, I suppose you didn't."

For some reason, that makes them both laugh — and then they falter at the same time, too. 

"I guess we've, erm," starts Thomas, "got plenty of reasons to be cautious. Don't we."

Not that he didn't know that before, but he sure as hell knows it now.

"We do," says Ellis, soft now, a slump in his shoulders… a slump on him is what might pass for excellent posture on any other man, but it's there, the difference.

Thomas can't quite think of where to go from here, but it turns out he doesn't have to, because Ellis still has more on his mind: "tell you the truth, I was waiting for you, myself."

He'd sort of gathered that, but it means something to hear it said aloud.

"Ships that pass in the night," Thomas says. Bitter comes over him, a bad taste in his mouth, because it hurts just thinking about it, that they could have come so close and never really met. Here they are, and it's the first time he's ever seen so much of himself in anyone else in his whole life, and it's only happened because he went and got himself arrested. "Would've been a bloody tragedy, wouldn't it, me not getting to – to know you."

It's too honest, too open, and Ellis lowers his eyes like he's shy, doesn't say anything.

And then Thomas realises he _is_ shy, and it's a relief to know he's capable of it. He's not so perfect and composed as all that.

So he takes the opportunity to top up his tea and waits for him to say something, but it never comes.

To change the subject and because he's curious, he asks, "what'd you have in mind for the evening, originally?"

_How long did you intend on waiting?_

"Not much," says Ellis eventually. "I figured I'd buy you a beer, see how we got on…"

"And?"

"And drop hair pins until you picked one up, I suppose."

Thomas raises his eyebrows. "Don't you have a way with words, Mr Ellis."

He smirks.

"I didn't come up with that one on my own."

How bloody sheltered does he think he is, exactly?

"I _know_ that."

Ellis's lips quirk in amusement, and Thomas looks away, embarrassed.

"Just doesn't sound as stupid when you say it," he mutters.

"I should hope so," says Ellis, cheerful. "Said stupid things enough already today."

"Yeah, you and me both."

It takes some effort not to cringe at himself, looking back on things — and then it doesn't, because the feelings seem to flood him again, all at once, and he feels less like cringing and more like curling up in a ball.

"It was terrifying, walking out of there," he says, before he can stop himself. "Didn't know who'd… if somehow the Crawleys had found out already – " at this Ellis pales, clearly horrified at the prospect, and Thomas thinks he'll have to tell him all about _that_ history at some point, although the idea of greeting Lord or Lady Grantham in the street after was indeed horrific, " – and then it… it was you, and you tipped your hat and looked like you wanted to kill me."

He laughs.

Ellis doesn't.

"I didn't," he says gravely.

"I know that _now_."

"Had a moment where I wanted to kill the sergeant, though."

The words are almost too serious, and, not knowing exactly why he brought it up again, Thomas feels compelled to lighten this up somehow, get them back up to gallows humour if not further: "just one?"

"Yeah, from when I walked in to when I walked out."

It's not said like it's funny.

Thomas surveys him, a little wary: Ellis has a firm set in his brow, his head tilted just so. Intense, would be a word. It'd be scary if…

Well.

He saw it earlier in different circumstances, and it _was_ scary.

"Can't say I haven't felt like that before," Thomas offers. 

Because he has. At one point in his life probably half his diary entries were along the lines of what had made him feel capable of murder that day, except the feeling was usually never prompted by anyone legitimately worthy of him having it — used to be all a man had to do to get Thomas to see red was openly look at a girl he fancied.

In his humble opinion, the York police sergeant is guilty of more than that.

He adds, "people like that don't really – "

"I hate them," interrupts Ellis.

The words are so fervent as to be frightening, but they come out of his mouth like everything else does: steady and collected.

It takes Thomas aback, to say the least; he finds himself just staring at him with his mouth halfway open.

Ellis quickly looks away. "Not always, of course, not all normal folk's the same, but – "

"No, I understand."

Again, it's nice to know that he's got other sides to him, that he's not soaring above it all, unaffected. That he's bitter and hurt somewhere, too, even if not so much.

That he's not perfect.

Because if he's perfect, Thomas doesn't stand a chance.

"Yeah," says Ellis. "Yeah, you would."

God, everything _about_ this is nice, not just that. They _understand_ each other, he doesn't have to strain to be around him — he's got nerves, of course, hard to avoid that when you're after someone and you don't quite know what the state of things is, but it almost… 

"Feels rather like we've known one another for longer than we have, doesn't it, Mr Barrow?"

"Was thinking the same thing just now," Thomas says.

That smile of his is back, and he finds himself staring at it again.

Even their lulls are comfortable.

"I never…" Ellis starts, trailing off. He sips at his tea, then makes a face.

Cold, probably, and Thomas huffs out a laugh — at which Ellis makes another face, all shy again, and it makes his head spin — before asking, "never what?"

"Never apologised," he clarifies. "For, erm… at the station, when I…"

Aha.

"Left your hair up," teases Thomas.

It sounds stupid when he says it, because of course it does.

It makes Ellis chuckle, but before he can say anything again, Thomas says, "you don't owe me any apology, seeing what I owe you."

"Water under the bridge, Mr Barrow."

It bloody well is not.

But it sort of seems like Ellis is exasperated of hearing him say it, so he vows to shelve it for the rest of the night.

"So," he says.

"So?"

"You were going to buy me a beer."

Ellis laughs, warm and comforting. "We'll have to put that one on ice, for now."

It's at this time that Thomas begins to accept that maybe _Mr Richard Ellis, Valet to His Majesty, Royal Household, London SW1_ is probably, really, actually into him.

Into him, and leaving first thing tomorrow.

"It's as I said," he goes on, "I, er, don't make it up north much, but when I do…"

The prospect is thrilling.

He tries not to show how much.

"I'm sure I'll be around."

"I should think," Ellis says brightly. "Hear you're important around here."

_From bloody who?_

"Might want to get your ears checked." 

"Heard it too many times for that," less bright, but still casual and lighthearted.

It ought to be encouraging; it isn't.

"Collective delusion, then," Thomas mutters.

Ellis frowns.

…why does he always bloody do this? Leave it to the rest of them to warn men about him, let them air out his dirty laundry; he doesn't have to fucking do it himself, and yet he always _does._ Besides, in this case it might not even be true, anymore, a week ago he wouldn't have argued, might even have gotten cocky about it — okay, definitely would have — but after what's happened… 

"Well, now, it wasn't a mutiny _downstairs,_ was it?" says Ellis. He's all blithe again. "How long've you been in service, again?"

Thomas blinks.

"Twenty years, nearly," he says slowly. 

"And at Downton?"

"Seventeen."

Once again, there's that sly half-smile Thomas has come to be obsessed with.

"I'm disappointed, Mr Barrow," Ellis returns, cheeky, but the words drag up something unpleasant in Thomas's chest. "All that time, and you still haven't realised a servant is always far more important than anyone of _note_ ," he points to the ceiling, "thinks they are…"

And he's smiling for real now, wide — the vestiges of that old anxiety dissolve upon seeing it, gone as quickly as they came, and Thomas finds he's smiling again, himself.

Because Ellis really does have a way of making things all right.

He drops his head, looks up at him through his eyelashes, feeling self-conscious.

"World may be changing," Ellis continues, "but none of them could ever get anything done without us. Don't you forget it."

"If you insist," Thomas replies drily.

"I do."

"Very insistent person, aren't you, Mr Ellis," because he can be cheeky, too, and Ellis laughs aloud.

"Thank heavens for that."

How different things would be if he wasn't.

"Yeah," says Thomas. And then he deliberates as to whether or not he should ask the question that's been on his mind since they started talking, from the very first day onward. 

Ellis must notice he's being indecisive; he raises his eyebrows, tilts his head.

"Penny for your thoughts?"

Might as well.

"Where do you stand politically?"

It's clear he hadn't expected the question. Ellis doesn't falter, not really, but he hums, then sits up, leans back in his chair — Thomas hadn't realised he'd been leaning forward as much as he had, and, aware that he's doing the same thing, straightens up and clasps his hands in his lap.

"Are you asking if I'm a Royalist?"

Thomas shrugs.

He wasn't, necessarily, but he'd hoped they'd get there eventually, so… 

"I might be."

Ellis nods, and he seems to genuinely consider it.

Thomas starts picking at his thumb, watching him out of the corner of his eye.

The thing is, if he's even half as shrewd as Thomas has been giving him credit for, he'd know very well whether he was or wasn't already. There can't be much of a reason for him to deliberate.

But he does, and for a while, too.

"It wasn't my own reputation that got you out of jail tonight," he says eventually, thoughtful, and Thomas sucks on his cheeks and looks away.

It's true, but it's not exactly what he was hoping to hear.

He realises what he's doing and rolls his fingers into a fist.

"I'm assuming you're not one, yourself," Ellis adds.

"Believe I asked you first."

"I don't bite the hand that feeds me, Mr Barrow."

That's fair enough, he supposes.

"But I don't lick it, either."

Thomas looks back at him, abrupt; the smirk on his face tells him he's been sitting on that line for the last however many minutes. 

"Guessing that's not something you share with the rest of them," he muses.

"The entourage, you mean?"

Thomas nods.

Ellis shakes his head.

"Lawton may as well be a socialist," okay, _that's_ a surprise, although admittedly all she's really done in his presence is sneer, so it's not like he has much to go on, "and as for the rest, I've got more than one thing to keep quiet, I suppose."

Thomas raises his eyebrows. "And what is it you keep quiet exactly, in this case?"

"I don't bite the hand that feeds me," Ellis repeats. "But if you ask me…"

"Go on."

"So long as I stayed fed, I wouldn't give a damn if all this toppled tomorrow."

Good answer, in Thomas's opinion. Shows he looks out for himself.

In addition to how he quite plainly looks after others.

"Sums that up, doesn't it," he says.

"You?"

Easy answer.

"I vote Labour," Thomas tells him, "and I'm not about to go around calling myself a republican, but…"

"Plenty things you oughtn't go around saying," returns Ellis, "doesn't make 'em any less true."

In about a million ways.

They're silent for a little while, probably thinking the same thing, and then Thomas says, "how do you know she's a socialist?"

His lips quirk.

"We do speak to one another occasionally."

Literally just occasionally, seems like.

"Haven't seen you do it since you arrived."

In fact, he'd sort of assumed the Royal Household was every man for himself, given how little they interact with one another when they're not complaining about the accommodations.

"You haven't taken a smoke break since we arrived," says Ellis pointedly.

So it's that sort of thing.

"Bloody wish I have," Thomas grumbles, not sure whether he means _because I've really needed one_ or _because I would like to see you with a cigarette in your mouth_ (answers his question from earlier, doesn't it)... and then he sees the curious expression on Ellis's face, gets over himself, and says, "you and her are pals, then?"

"Not especially."

Okay, so it's _really_ that sort of thing.

"I've got something on her," Ellis continues, nonchalant, "and she's got something on me," very intentionally — no prize for guessing just what, Thomas supposes, given the look on his face, and he finds himself wondering what he knows about her that's got anywhere near the same amount of potential consequences. "I wouldn't call us friends, but… we take care of each other, I suppose."

How about that.

"Had someone like that here, once."

"Yeah?"

Right down to the cigarettes.

Thomas swallows, feeling shy again. "Except we were friends, sort of, at one point, but that was years ago."

"Not around anymore, I take it?"

"She's off in India, last I heard. Up and left after about twenty years of service to Lady Grantham." 

"There a story there?"

"There's a story everywhere, Mr Ellis."

"If you know where to look."

Nice to have someone who can finish his bloody sentences for him — he'd never thought that was a real thing, and yet here they are and it's happening, and not for the first time in the night, either.

Ellis raises his eyebrows. He's smiling again.

"Do you really want to know?" Thomas asks, because even after everything he still feels as though he's one step away from… 

Whatever thing about him it is that'll make Ellis want to run for it, he guesses. 

There's bound to be something. Ellis just hasn't hit it yet. 

Getting into anything that happened while O'Brien was around will probably do the trick.

"Sort of a long one, for it to make sense," he adds.

"Even better," says Ellis, nearly in earnest.

Thomas surveys him, considering.

He continues, "I've got some long stories of my own," a glint in his eye, and… Thomas likes the idea of a trade, here. 

It helps that he's so attractive Thomas can't in good, selfish conscience refuse him anything.

"Right, well. Er, back when I started at Downton…"

So he tells Ellis about him and O'Brien, eliding some of the finer details — the ones where he really, _really_ doesn't come out looking his best, rather, but also as much to do with Jimmy as he can get away with and still get the point to come across, and though Ellis is evidently horrified at some of the implications and a bit judgmental at times he does not, in fact, make a run for it.

And he _does_ have long stories of his own, ones that give Thomas some encouragement (turns out he was only _a bit_ judgmental because that's all he really had the right to be) such that he starts to hope that maybe this will work out after all.

Naturally, once he starts to move past hope and toward actually thinking anything he ruins it by nearly falling asleep in the middle of Ellis's sentence.

Ellis only laughs, though, and Thomas startles at the sound.

"Sorry," he says, sheepish. His head is beginning to feel like a rock. "What were you saying, exactly?"

"Something that can wait," says Ellis as he takes out his watch. He double takes. "Christ, it's a quarter to four."

"That would explain it," Thomas says wryly, and then he finds himself blinking away sleep again —

"Right, Mr Barrow, let's get you to bed."

He has to pinch himself not to say anything stupid about _that_.

Ellis takes care of getting the dishes to the scullery with a gentle admonition that it'd be best if no one knew they were down here so late in the evening; on the way up the stairs, he keeps a light touch at the center of Thomas's back.

It is thrilling.

It makes him think things that are in no uncertain terms putting the cart before the horse.

"Don't know why I'm so tired," he says absentmindedly, volume just above a whisper.

_What a stupid thing to say._

"Even if it weren't four in the morning, you had rather a long day."

"Yeah."

They don't say anything more than that until they're at Ellis's room — he opens it, steps inside, and then they just look look at each other from opposite sides of the threshold.

"You know," starts Ellis.

He's standing with one hand holding the door open and the other on the frame. There's something sensual and inviting about his posture, and it makes Thomas feel weak in the knees.

"You were right, earlier."

Thomas thinks about what and comes up short.

"Typically am," he says, slow and coy and plain old sleepy, and Ellis takes the hint.

He straightens, tilts his head forward — even in the darkness his eyes are gorgeous.

"It'd've been a tragedy, if we didn't get to know each other."

 _Is this it?_ Thomas asks himself, wary, heartbeat quickening, _is something going to happen?_

"But we did," Thomas returns, hopeful.

"And we are."

And they will?

Thomas takes a deep breath and does his best to keep looking Ellis in the eye, because he gets the sense that if he doesn't, this thing they've created together is going to disappear into thin air.

 _Something is going to happen,_ Thomas tells himself, _something has to happen,_ _he's not going to leave you doubting and wanting, not after everything that's happened between you…_

Nothing happens.

Even though they're so close they could kiss.

"Goodnight, Mr Ellis," Thomas says after a moment.

"Goodnight, Mr Barrow." 

The words linger, heavy in the air.

Something comes over him, some intrepid, heedless part of him that he'd thought had died years ago — 

Thomas sets his right hand upon Ellis's face, fingertips in his hair, mussing at the edges.

He strokes his thumb across his cheekbone. 

He leans forward.

He hears Ellis's breath hitch, sees his eyelids flutter, and before he can lose his nerve, Thomas turns his head and murmurs, into his ear, lips light and delicate upon his skin, "thank you."

As he pulls away, he is careful to hover at the corner of his jaw for just the right time, a moment longer than necessary but not for so long he's pushing it, and he thinks about kissing Ellis: there on his jaw, and then on his cheek, and then on his lips — 

— and then he _does_ lose his nerve, and he steps back.

It's a nice change (he _hopes_ it's nice, that he hasn't completely misread what's actually what and he's not about to get kicked in the teeth in either the figurative or literal sense), after everything, to see Ellis rendered truly speechless.

"Goodnight," he repeats, suddenly hoarse, and Ellis, utterly floored, _God he hopes that look on his face means what he thinks it does_ , opens his mouth only to just nod.

They really could kiss. 

Instead, they stare at one another, uncertain, and then Thomas nods, too. Simultaneously, they part, Ellis back into his room and Thomas further into the corridor.

By the time he hears the door shut and latch behind him he's already paces away.

As he falls asleep, he thinks of what might have happened if he'd stepped forward, instead.

**Author's Note:**

> as always, find me as [@combeferre on tumblr](https://combeferre.tumblr.com)!


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